This world map based on the population will change your view of our planet

shutterstock

The maps you will find in this article will tell you more about the global population than your geography and history teachers did. Are you ready to get surprised?

This comprehensive cartogram created by Our World in Data reveals the truth about the population of Earth's countries and its density. Using this map, you can take a new look at what is happening around the globe.

Each square in the picture represents half a million people living in the country. So the size of every country on the cartogram represents the size of its population, not area.

The map was created by Max Roser, the founder of Our World in Data. It is based on the information collected in 2018. You can access the full resolution image here.

Now let's look closer at each region.

Asia and Oceania

Open in full resolution

Some things to pay attention to:

South East Asia is VERY densely populated, while such big countries as Kazakhstan (1.052 million mi²), Mongolia (604,600 mi²) and Australia (2.97 million mi²) have large uninhabited areas.

Can you imagine how large the Asian part of Russia is? It comprises around 77% of the total area of the country (about 5,000,000 mi²). Now look at the cartogram: only 34 million of people live there. Compare it to the population of such countries as Iran (636,400 mi²) or Pakistan (340,509 mi²).

36.2% of the population of the planet live in India and China. In 1850, fewer people lived on the whole planet than now live in each of these countries.

ADVERTISEMENT

The Americas

Open in full resolution

Interesting facts:

The first country to pay attention to is Canada. The second largest country in the world (3.855 million mi²), it's home only to 37 million people. The population density is 4 people per km² (0.4 mi²). That's why on the cartogram it occupies a small space.

The South American countries look almost the same way as on the ordinary map. Their population density is relatively similar.

The USA is the most populous country in the Americas and the third most populous country on the planet. The population of the most populous state, California, is larger than that of Canada, Venezuela, and Chile and Guatemala combined.

Africa

Open in full resolution

Some facts about African population:

The largest country of Africa – Algeria (919,600 mi²) – is also sparsely populated, while Nigeria (356,667 mi²) is home to approximately 195 million people!

More than half of Africans are younger than 25 years.

Africa now has the highest rate of population growth, which is one of the major problem in the world – over 25 million people there are HIV-positive.

Europe

Open in full resolution

Some facts about Europe:

Population of Europe is quite small, but it remains one of the most powerful and richest regions of the planet.

Almost twice as many people live in China as in Europe.

Approximately 300,000 people live in Iceland – that's the size of a medium-sized town in Russia, Ukraine or Belarus.

Europe has much lower birth rate per 1,000 people than the rest of the world.

If you want to know more, use this amazing interactive map from Our World in Data:

If you hover the mouse on the bracket from 0 to 10 on the legend then you see the world's least densely populated countries. Use the slider to change the year.

Was this information interesting? What surprised you the most? Do you want to add something?

Tell us in the comments.